Best way to.....

David or anyone,

If i wanted to create an estimating app, not a real complicaated one so that I need to tap into some server database somewhere, but rather a fairly small system with data that would be stored from a csv file or ??

The app would then use dropdown selectors to choose various data values from the list. Each selection then selecting other button info that is filtered by the last selection, Usually there would be from 3 to 5 selections to make to get to the right item you wanted. Once you go there it would then return to you the price and a few other pieces of data.

Now you would take those selected items and data and put them into a list of information that could be added up and other factors used to modifiy the numbers. All math functions.

Finally all this would be produced as a report that could me email or text to someone using the phone share features.

What would be the best tools to use to create such a thing here?

What would be the best sample to start with?

I feel that connecting to a mysql server would be my first choice but not sure nor do I have the knowledge set to do that.

I am open to ideas.

Thanks Don

Hello Donald,

David or anyone,

If i wanted to create an estimating app, not a real complicaated one so that I need to tap into some server database somewhere, but rather a fairly small system with data that would be stored from a csv file or ??

I am not completely sure if understand your question (no doubt my poor english strikes again) but if you wanted to have some data source files for your application, in order to load such data and do something with that, probably the best suitable format for the source files can be JSON. We can take a look at the various JSON* samples included in App Builder.

In fact, we we load a JSON file, their objects are available "as is" in App Buidler. For example, note this JSON file used in the JSON app sample:

Once we get that file using an HTTP Client control, for example, we can access to their data very quickly:

The ID, Name and LastName are now into the appropiate variables, directly from the JSON response. Said that, probably a way to convert CSV to JSON using Javascript exists out there. I will take a look and try to provide such ability.

The app would then use dropdown selectors to choose various data values from the list. Each selection then selecting other button info that is filtered by the last selection, Usually there would be from 3 to 5 selections to make to get to the right item you wanted. Once you go there it would then return to you the price and a few other pieces of data.

This is perfectly possible Donald and in fact it's a common practice, so, what we need is to prepare the required Select controls, feed them with the appropiate data, and uses the Select control's events to be ready when the user choose certain option. Maybe a sample of this can be found in the Datatime application included by App Builder. When we select a year from the Years Select, we uses their Change event to update the contents of a Month Select control, and, in the same way, we use this last control Change event in order to update another Day Select.

Now you would take those selected items and data and put them into a list of information that could be added up and other factors used to modifiy the numbers. All math functions.

You know App Builder have dozens of Maths' related actions and even a Math action which can be used to evaluate math expressions. So it's a question of dealing with the various Select variables and these actions.

Finally all this would be produced as a report that could me email or text to someone using the phone share features.

Probably the best option is to send the mail by yourself using certain server script. Made an HTTP call from App Builder it's quite easy and we can provide such call with the appropiate data, as you can see in the application samples who uses the HttpClient control. The server script receive the required data (email address, user name, etc.) and can compose the email or receive it composed by our application.

I know out there are some APIs to send emails directoy from Javascript, but this APIs have a price (logical on the other hand) and probably we can avoid their use at least in our case by use a more or less simple server script.

What would be the best tools to use to create such a thing here?

What would be the best sample to start with?

I think you can familiarize with the App Builder's samples before start. I mentioned some of them above and probably they are sufficient to be ready to create your own application. Maybe the most complicated part is the files we talking above. I don't know if that files already exists, if you can create it using JSON (to be more easy to process), etc. But I am here if you need some help Donald.

I feel that connecting to a mysql server would be my first choice but not sure nor do I have the knowledge set to do that.

Remember the included Database sample. They are not too complicated, but shown us how to retrive information from a MySQL database, how to shown that information to the user, and how to insert, update and delete existing information. Again, if you have ANY question, do not hesitate to post here and I will try to help you. :)